Food news: pink gin and steamed puddings

The Red Hot Chilli Cookbook by Dan May (£16.99, Ryland Peters & Small).
Dan May, the man who runs the Trees Can’t Dance chilli sauce company, looks
just as you would expect: balding, bearded and tough. That’s reassuring to
the consumer who, if he likes chillies enough to buy a book about them,
wouldn’t want it to be written by a wimp. No, he would like his author to
look as though he ate flames for breakfast and be entirely au fait with all
kinds of fiery, serotonin-boosting recipes. And that’s exactly what you get
here – Jamaican jerk marinade, habañero marmalade, Peruvian chilli and
garlic chicken, and so on. There’s gentle stuff too, though: Provençal lamb
casserole, chilli chai and Beck’s Tarka Dahl, which even May’s one-year-old
daughter likes. All the recipes are graded by heat – jalapeño poppers are
pretty hot

Jalapeño poppers

Makes 20

20 deseeded jalapeño chillies, slit on one side

40g grated cheddar

50g flour

1 egg, beaten

sunflower oil for deep-frying

Stuff the chillies with the cheddar. Put the flour in one bowl, and the beaten
egg in another. Roll the chillies in the flour, dip in the egg and coat once
more with flour. Half-fill a large saucepan with oil. Heat until it reaches
190C on a cooking thermometer. Fry the chillies in small batches for six to
seven minutes until golden. Remove with a slotted spoon and drain on kitchen
paper.